


in every realm...

by coalitiongirl_ficlets (coalitiongirl)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F, Tumblr Prompts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-11
Updated: 2018-06-06
Packaged: 2019-05-05 07:35:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 7,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14612943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coalitiongirl/pseuds/coalitiongirl_ficlets
Summary: A place for all my Swan Queen Tumblr prompts!





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I originally was going to just post them all as separate fics so they're tagged and organized and everything but...........I legitimately haven't moved prompts here since April 2016, my god. So a fic for Tumblr prompts it is! I'm SORRY, I know these are so annoying organized this way, but there are so many and I don't want to overwhelm y'all with updates either!!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> March 2016: Who makes the first move? How does it go?

Neither of them makes the first move, really, unless you count…oh, a hundred statements that are never quite a  _move_. 

Unless you count Regina, eyes fierce as she talks Emma down from a ledge–  _it’s descending into hell, for fuck’s sake, I won’t let you sacrifice any more for a useless–_ or Emma shouting back as fiercely–  _what else do I have? what else is there to fight for?_ – and the wild-eyed fury and non-answer that follows before Emma listens, simple as that. And Regina is scathing and abrupt and still so gentle in the moments when Emma turns to her to find a reason.

Unless you count Emma’s sullen silence fading into her diminished presence in the shadows of the mansion, barely a ghost at meals and hovering in the sitting room and sleeping on the couch. Henry is protective, Regina doesn’t comment, and when it comes to a head ( _Regina, what do we have when you begin and end with her?_ and only silence in response. And another second try packs his bags and surrenders to an inevitability that no one dares to name), Emma flickers like a bulb switched on and sits down at last, beside her son and his mother as a tangible being again.

Unless you count the whisper of rumors, of hands clasped together in the street that have Henry shaking off suspicions. He can’t say  _they’re just holding each other up_ because no one would understand, and they wouldn’t most of all. No one’s made the first move, see? But in the moments they aren’t together, they orbit each other like gravity, like Regina turning a moment before Emma’s in the doorway and like Emma closing her eyes and listening to footsteps still a minute away.

Unless you count the first mention of  _family dinner_ that has Emma whipping around and flushing, the first mention of  _the people I love_ that has Regina’s eyes widen fractionally. There are a dozen confessions muted under casual remarks, a dozen times their spines stiffen and relax, a dozen almost-concessions that can be something meaningless if you squint. There’s a lot of squinting.

Unless you count a casual goodbye kiss one morning, one on Henry’s cheek and one on Regina’s that has the house freeze for a moment with the undeniable. Unless you count Emma’s hands tangling and untangling on the doorknob, desperate to escape but still waiting, waiting, until there’s an unsteady  _see you at lunch_ from the woman behind her and three quiet exhales like sighs in the silence of the mansion.

Unless you count friendly kisses and hugs that begin to linger, extra contact that cycles from handholding to shoulders bumping on the couch to a night after a close call during an attack on the town that has Regina leading Emma upstairs without a word and pressing herself to her, protective and needy and gulping in short-breathed sobs until Emma twists around and strokes her hair and whispers,  _We’re okay_. And they’re okay.

Unless you count the day when it goes too far, when the casual kiss on Emma’s cheek creeps close enough to her lips, when Henry gets shoved around at school for something more than just being the Evil Queen’s son, when Regina overhears Deputy Hua calling her Emma’s  _wife_ and Emma’s stammered reply. Unless you count comfort fading into discomfort, wistful eyes and aching hearts, and a departure from the ease of pretending.

Unless you count the day when tension becomes conflict, petty arguments louder than they’ve been in months and both of them on the verge of tears– Emma hasn’t cried since  _that asshole_ , and Regina is as terrified when it happens as Emma is when it happens for her, and then Emma is packing a bag and fleeing Mifflin Street and their quiet house is harsh and angry and far too big. And they still can’t define what they’re fighting about, because some things are more frightening than tears.

Unless you count Regina rapping on the door to Emma’s car an hour later, seething with fear and righteous anger until she sees Emma’s face and falters.  _Back for Round Two?_ Emma says, so tired, and Regina slides into the passenger seat and leans in and Emma kisses her and Regina says wryly  _about time_ and slides her palm against the taut skin of Emma’s stomach.

(After, each insists that she had been the one to make the first move. Of course.  _Of course._ )


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> October 2015: Written after Regina casually used the dagger in 502.

When she remembers, the dreamcatcher in her hand, it’s in a rush of  _too much, too horrifying._ it’s with the rush that the dagger has soaring through her, the way it whispers temptations in the dark. it’s with Emma frozen in front of her in terror and fury and so much vulnerability that Regina can’t believe that she’d  _laughed_ –

Except all she remembers is  _power,_ power she should never have been entrusted with. power is a drug she’d never wanted until it had surrounded her, and she’d never wanted it again until she’d fallen painfully in love with Emma Swan and watched her never know at all. until she’d fallen painfully in love and watched Emma give her heart to a man and until she’d tried desperately to give her own heart to another man in response.

She’d succumbed before Emma ever had.

She sets down the dreamcatcher, sees Emma in front of her with hard eyes and long limbs, moving with the sleek walk of the dark and powerful. Regina knows that walk. Regina hates it every time she sees Emma use it. “this was my betrayal,” she says blankly.

“That would require me to give a damn about you,” Emma retorts, but there’s that same frozen vulnerability beneath the anger. even the Dark One hurts over this, and Regina wants to  _scream_ because she’s spent her whole life struggling to matter to even a single person with her brand of dark magic and now she only hurts instead. Emma twirls the dagger in her hand and Regina can only gape at it in horror.

“I don’t know why,” she says, because she can’t grasp her own thoughts in that moment through the dreamcatcher and she thinks that if she did she’d be too sickened to even try with Emma anymore. to try at all, because if she’d  _meant_ it, who the hell is she? “Emma…” 

She reaches out for her and Emma rears back, slashes out with the dagger and draws a red line across Regina’s palm. “ _don’t touch me!”_ she snarls and Regina stumbles back. the Dark One regains her composure, containing her fury so it burns only behind her eyes. “is this what you wanted?” she demands, slinking forward. the tip of the dagger draws blood beneath Regina’s chin, pushes it up as Regina stands very still.

“Did you think you could make me love you?” Emma whispers, leaning forward to graze her lips across Regina’s. “did you think you could kiss that idiot-faced bastard until you found some  _fucking_ true love to save me?” she laughs mockingly and Regina raises her chin, lets the Dark One kiss her freely on unresponsive lips. “i will never love you,” she snarls. “i will never forgive you. i want you  _broken.”_

Regina does kiss her back then, strokes a hand through pale hair and moves forward until the point of the dagger is pressed to her pulse point and her own hand is pressed over Emma’s. she kisses her and kisses her and there are no apologies, no forgiveness, no magical bridges wrought between two women who’ve torn each other to shreds too often. she pours all of herself into this moment between them and Emma gasps and lets out something like a sob and rocks back, away from her, the dagger protective between them.

The Dark One shivers violently and holds her hands up like  _i saved you, now save me._ like  _i was just looking for you to be my friend._ like a hapless savior gazing up at her on her second day in town,  _that_   _i didn’t have to be alone on my birthday_. “no,” she says, and shakes her head. “no, you couldn’t possibly…you couldn’t really love… _no,”_ she breathes.

“I could,” Regina says hopelessly, uselessly. “and i still…” 

Emma flees from her into the night.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> September 2015: A Twitter story post-S4.

This story begins with a true love’s kiss.  _Well_. It actually begins with Regina rushing to Emma at full speed, their prior conflict forgotten as the end of the world that Emma had unleashed bears down on them, and it begins with Emma meeting Regina’s eyes and Regina taking the Dark One into her arms, shielding her from the magic erupting from a portal.

Emma murmurs something that might be “I’m sorry,” and Regina shielding her becomes a lot more like Regina hugging her, and there’s an instinctive kiss brushed to the top of Emma’s head and everything changes.

The light explodes from them in a burst of color and the portal around them no longer seems to be raining hell down upon them and Emma stares up at Regina and Regina stares back at her and Emma’s changing now, too. The darkness within her erupts into the portal and they’re caught in a maelstrom and pulled in with it.

And THAT’S how Season Five ends.

* * *

We return to Emma and Regina at the start of S6, traipsing through a world that isn’t theirs, snarking and muttering and darting glances at each other as they move through the underbrush.

They find a cave to hide in that first night. “Do you think this is, like, the Lion King?” Emma murmurs. “Are we going to wake up and someone’s going to be singing Hakuna Matata while hyenas maul our faces?”

“I’ll keep watch,” is all Regina says. 

They don’t talk about the other thing. They don’t talk about how Emma's face is clear and her eyebrows are back and she no longer walks like she’s mentally restraining herself from murder. 

Emma wakes up three hours later and insists that she’ll take the rest of the night. Regina lies down and breathes evenly and pretends she doesn’t notice when Emma’s fingers run through her hair and caressing the curve of her jaw.

* * *

In the morning, there are no lions or wolves or anyone singing Disney tunes but there are grey skies that seem to move with them as though they’re seeking something out that they can’t touch within the two women. “It’s the Dark One,” Emma says. “It still wants us." 

"How do you know?” Regina asks.

Emma says, “I know,” and she stares up at it like she might want it back, too. Regina doesn’t say a word. She doesn’t know why the magic won’t come for her, as it did before. (She knows. They know what it is they have that wards off the Dark One. They don’t talk about it.)

It takes two days before Emma says again, voice rough and uncertain, “I’m sorry.” She’s done so much damage, hurt everyone in the process and perhaps Henry most of all, and she’d been a menace toying with Regina for weeks. 

“I know,” Regina says. There’s nothing more you can say when you have the history they do with each other. And Emma breathes out a sigh of relief like it means so much more than it sounds like. (They still don’t talk about the other thing, not when they both fall asleep keeping watch and wake up entwined. Not when they find water and Regina’s nearly drowned by a massive sea beast and Emma is screaming furiously between sobs as she wards it off. Not when Regina makes it back onto shore and they’re still holding hands for too long, staring into each other’s eyes.) 

Instead they’re snippy, uncertain, alternating between snapping at each other & apologizing, and at night now they huddle together and talk about Henry or Storybrooke or anything but Regina’s lips at the top of Emma’s head, white light exploding from the contact into a burst of the most powerful magic of all.

* * *

They make it home. Rumple and Belle help with some kind of portal and Henry is waiting for them, laughing and throwing his arms around them as Snow follows suit, and then both of them are bowled over by…two others.

Two they hadn’t thought of since the moment they’d gone through that portal. And Hook is shoving past Snow to wrap his arms around Emma and Robin is squeezing Regina so tightly that she can’t breathe, and the women catch each other’s eyes and hold, still awkward and still uncertain. 

Emma breaks free from Hook and watches Regina limp in Robin’s arms, and she brushes her fingers along Regina’s elbow and murmurs, “Welcome back.”

“You too,” Regina says in a scratchy voice, and Emma doesn’t know why she wants to hide somewhere and weep.

* * *

Snow marvels at this world that had freed Emma of the Dark One and Emma nods and smiles. Hook says, “I'm impressed you and the queen managed a week alone together without any deaths,” and laughs like it’s all a joke. Like everything that had happened is a joke and now it’s time to go back to normal.

And they try. They really, really do. They do weekly meetings as mayor and sheriff and they do dinners with Henry and they’re very, very cordial. Whatever friendship they’d had before Emma’s sacrifice is gone, replaced with eyes that shift downward when the other sees her staring, with touches that linger and with magic that they use together that makes them breathless and unstoppable and exhilarated until the moment it dies again.

* * *

Emma’s the first to break, slipping away from her new house in the dead of night and running through the streets of Storybrooke until she’s standing in front of Regina’s door, barefoot and in pajamas and shaking a little as she knocks on the door. 

Robin opens it. “Emma,” he says, confused. 

Emma shifts from bare foot to bare foot and says, “Sorry, I’ll just…I’m gonna just go." 

Robin calls her name and Emma takes off into the night, running off to where the portal had first opened. It’s out by the sand near where Henry’s old castle used to be, and Emma huddles against broken driftwood and misses a stupid world with grey skies and sea monsters and Regina’s embrace.

She hears Regina come silently to her, hears her sit down on the driftwood and sees the thin fabric of satin pajamas. Regina doesn’t say a word and Emma doesn’t dare speak, either, so they sit together and watch the water in silence.

"I brought you a sweater,” Regina says finally, draping it over Emma’s thin, bare shoulders.

Emma says, “You knew I was out here.”

“Of course I knew,” Regina whispers. And this isn’t only the place where the portal opened, it’s the place where they’d shared a… (They don’t talk about it.)

* * *

They go back to their homes that night. They go back to the thoughts they can’t admit to and the stares and they go back to the safety that two men represent. They go back to lies and fear, fear, fear the truth. 

At night, one or the other or both sit silently on rotting driftwood and stare out into the ocean.

Robin talks about marriage. Hook talks about some kind of adventure on his ship away from Storybrooke. "I said no,“ Emma says, digging her bare feet into the sand. "Have to be your maid of honor at the wedding, huh?”

“I said no too,” Regina says, and Emma looks up at her in surprise. Regina refuses to tear her eyes from the sea.

“Well,” Emma says. “Okay then.”

And when Regina glances at her she sees that she’s smiling. 

Regina smiles, too, a tiny shard of light gleaming in her heart like hope. 

They go home when they can’t hide from sunrise anymore.

* * *

Regina kisses Emma first, which comes both as a surprise and not as one at all. 

They aren’t on the sand this time. They’re doing their weekly mayoral meeting and they’re talking as casually as they can manage and Regina stands up to walk her out and– there’s something about the light on her face and the fact that Emma is free again and so unbelievably EMMA and– 

Regina leans forward and Emma buries herself in Regina’s arms as though she’s been waiting for another hug since the moment they’d gone through that portal. And Regina kisses the top of her head in the same way as last time, but this time Emma raises her face to watch Regina with aching need in her eyes.

Regina kisses her forehead, kisses her eyelids closed and the tip of her nose and the corner of her mouth and Emma brushes her nose against Regina’s and lets the next kiss land on her lips. And again, chaste and careful. 

And suddenly Emma’s spinning them around and Regina’s backed up against the door and there’s more kissing, furious and endless and as though they’re both starving, and then there’s Regina’s skirt hoisted up and Emma's pants yanked down and hands and fingers everywhere and they’re both sobbing, both so caught up in desperation that they can’t remember how to breathe in any way but with wracked, needy gasps. And they climb and fall together, again and again and again, foreheads pressed together and fingers scrabbling together at the end like they can’t bear to let go. 

“Yeah?” Emma whispers after, and her eyes are shining and she’s glowing with the energy of promises of a future where they’re  _easy_ in all the ways they’ve never been before. 

“Yes,” Regina murmurs, and she kisses Emma again, both of them still with tears spilling down their cheeks and relief so bright within them that they’re like sunshine in the rain.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> September 2015: Another Twitter story about an alternate 5a.

Emma is never truly  _saved_  from being the Dark One- it’s an eternal curse, and one that she’s doomed to. But at the last moment of the battle- after Emma goes off the deep end, after she hurts everyone and they’ve all but given up– in that moment in the dark, Regina manages to get the better of her.

And Emma is lying there on the ground and everyone thinks that she’s gone– dead, lost, etc– when SUDDENLY…

There’s a bolt of multicolored light that shoots out from around her. No one sees anything more than the shadowy figure bent over Emma, and when Emma sits up, the figure is gone. And Emma is– well, not cured– but her light magic is back and she can learn to take control of herself again. And she swears that she felt lips touching her forehead but no one will step forward to claim them.

Hook says it doesn’t matter, Henry wishes he’d thought of it, Snow smiles but firmly denies it. Regina scoffs at the whole search and makes a snide remark about Emma and self-love, because of course she does. Emma laughs, freer than she’s been in a long time, and Regina watches from a corner with shadowed eyes.

* * *

Emma starts to learn to navigate these two kinds of magic within her, with Regina’s help. And there are late nights and apple cider and Emma still dwelling on the mysterious person who’d kissed her. 

“Maybe Killian didn’t want me to feel pressured,” she muses. Regina gives her a dubious look. “Okay, no.”

“Do you think that Belle is secretly in love with me?” she suggests. Regina elbows her  _hard_.

Eventually, she stops asking and she stops wondering and Regina seems to breathe more easily around her. As time passes, they do less magic practice and more drinking, less business and more chatting. And at the end of one night, after too much alcohol and too much thinking, Emma’s waving around her glass and back to this mysterious TLK. “It’s impossible!” she insists. “It has to be mutual and I don’t love anyone but Mom and Dad and Henry and–" 

"And Hook,” Regina supplies, and there’s that  _thing_  in her eyes again.

“Right,” Emma says dully, feeling suddenly bleak. “And Hook.” And it’s never felt less sincere than now.

And she doesn’t know what it is that consumes her when Regina is around and she wonders– when she dares– the things she isn’t supposed to wonder. And she knows that Regina is keeping a secret from her but she doesn’t dare believe what it is. Regina is happy with her soulmate, right? (“Oh,” Regina says when Emma mentions him casually, in the exact same tone as Emma has when she remembers Hook. “Yes.”)

* * *

Emma kisses her one night, drunk and desperate for the connection, and Regina holds her tightly and then pushes her away with gentle hands.  _We don’t do this_ , she says.  _You don’t want this,_  she says.

“You kissed me,” Emma says stubbornly. “You kissed me when I was the Dark One." 

Regina shakes her head. "I didn't–” But she’s lying, Emma always knows when she’s lying, and she wants so desperately for this to be true. “Emma,” she says helplessly. “Emma, we’re friends. We love each other– like– friends.”

Her fingers are twitching like she’s holding herself back. Emma gapes at her and the unspoken admission. “Please, Emma. You’ve given up enough for me,“ Regina whispers. "It doesn’t have to mean anything.”

Is that– is that what this is about? Emma reels backward. “You think I’d feel obligated to–" 

She’s stymied and a little angry, honestly, this secret kept from her out of some misguided attempt to  _protect_  her from… falling in love with her best friend? She’s supposed to be the stupidly noble one. "I make my own choices,” she says thickly. “I don’t settle into whatever magic demands of me.”

It’s a hit, and a nasty one, and Regina sees right through it. “Don’t,” she says. 

“Why not?” Emma retorts. She’s done. She stands, staggering a bit from the effects of the cider, and she jabs a finger at Regina. “Go back to your happy ending,” she snaps. “Isn’t that why you never said anything? You picked yours. You don’t want ME." 

Regina stares at her, her face colorless. Emma makes it to the door when she trips– 

And hands steady her from behind. She turns, Regina’s face too close, her eyes dark and uncertain. "Don’t,” Regina says again, and this time she kisses Emma.

True love’s kiss had been like waking up but this– cider breath and nervous giggles and swaying in the doorway– this is like coming home. 

And Emma closes her eyes and smiles.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> October 2015: Regina and Henry adopt a dog and Dark Swan falls in love.

Please, sit back and listen to a story about the time that Regina and Henry adopt a dog and Dark Swan falls in love.

And it’s a  _really_ ugly dog when they first see it, a little puppy all skin-and-bones and curled up at the side of the road, hair matted down from the rain and whimpering pitifully.

Regina says, “Henry, we’re not getting a dog,” but there’s something that sticks within her and takes hold with this malnourished, abandoned puppy. There’s something about finding him on the side of the road, unwanted and all alone. And when they climb out of the car to inspect him, there’s something in the way he snaps weakly at their hand but doesn’t fight it when they bring him to the shelter.

At the shelter, Regina’s ready to leave the dog behind, but he barks once and nuzzles her hand and she hesitates. Henry says very seriously, “We can’t fail him,” and Regina knows that he’s thinking about the same thing as she is. 

They take the puppy to the vet and get started on nursing it back to health.

* * *

Across town, Dark Swan is angry and lashing out, holed up in her house most of the time and emerging only to create chaos. She stalks through the streets of Storybrooke and starts fights and fires, and Regina is the only one who seems at all capable of stopping her. 

Regina sits with a weak, little, angry puppy and feeds it gradually, brushing out its fur and crooning songs to it.

Regina fights with Dark Swan and undoes the damage as swiftly as Emma creates it. “Come back to Henry,” she says when they’re out of angry words and angrier magic. “Come back to your parents.” 

She doesn’t say  _Come back to me_ because Emma isn’t hers, right? Emma has never and will never be hers. And Dark Swan scoffs and stalks away in a burst of grey smoke.

* * *

Dark Swan doesn’t make a habit of visiting their house anymore, of coming too close to a Henry encounter. For all her insistences that she’s  _bad_ and  _evil_ and  _irredeemable_ , she doesn’t seem to have forgiven herself for hurting Henry. 

So it’s a surprise one afternoon when Regina is crouched down in the yard, helping the puppy that Henry’s named Thor stand on unsteady legs, and Emma’s voice sounds from behind her.

“What an ugly dog,” she says. She’s leaning against the side of the house, watching Regina expressionlessly.

Regina ignores her, stroking the puppy’s fur and offering him a treat. He staggers toward it, taking careful steps and snatching it out of her hand.

Emma says, “I would have expected a cat from you. You don’t have the patience for a dog.” It’s scornful, like she’s trying to mock Regina for a memory Regina can’t remember, like there’s an insult there for one of the many ways that Regina had supposedly failed her.

Regina focuses on the Thor, who’s fallen again, and gathers him onto her lap. She glances back once and sees Emma’s eyes on the puppy now, something she can’t read beneath the surface.

When Emma sees her watching, smoke billows around her and she vanishes.

* * *

But she’s back again the next day and the next, always when she knows Henry isn’t around, always when Regina is in the yard working on the muscle therapy for the puppy that the vet had recommended. 

And finally, Regina sighs and says, “Sit.”

Emma sits without question, sliding to the ground in all that tight leather and her long legs stretched in front of her. Regina gingerly places Thor onto her lap. “You’re not quite at the  _murders puppies_ stage, are you?” 

"Funny,” Emma says, giving her the patented Dark Swan glare.

Regina is less than intimidated. The puppy snuffles at Emma’s hand and Emma puts a tentative hand on its back. “It feels like a skeleton,” she mutters. “Skin and muscle barely stretched over bone.”

"He’s getting better,” Regina says. “We found him when he was a baby, starved and dying on the side of the road.” She doesn’t mention anything else, but it’s enough for Emma, whose whole body jerks at that and her eyes flash.

"And what, this is your  _redemption_?” she spits out. “Saving some goddamned puppy from the fate you left for me?” She laughs bitterly, shoving the puppy off her lap (gently, Regina notices). “Fuck  _off_ , Regina.”

She vanishes again into smoke, and this time she doesn’t come back to the house.

* * *

So Emma stops coming over.

The puppy is growing healthier, slowly but surely, and Regina puts most of her energy into nursing it back to health and into these ongoing confrontations with Dark Swan. 

Emma never starts up with her; but Regina comes as soon as she’s summoned for damage control and Emma deflates, flees with a few biting words as Regina undoes whatever harm she’s done this time. 

She doesn’t kill anyone, which Regina thinks is a good sign of…something? Of Dark Swan finding a balance between the darkness within her and the things she can’t come back from. Emma is struggling to find her place in the world now, to come to terms with this new existence of darkness and light combined.

If Regina could, she would grasp Emma now and stop her from ever hurting anyone, and it wouldn’t be about the town but about the girl within the Dark One who’s never going to forgive herself for any of this.

* * *

Thor the puppy is getting bigger now, stronger, a beautiful little golden retriever who’s ready to go for walks with Regina. She takes him out now, up and down the block and sometimes all the way to the park when he can manage it.

And one day, he’s finally strong enough to make it all the way past Emma’s house.

Emma is sitting on the porch when Regina walks past, and she watches Thor with a critical eye. Regina purses her lips together, eyes gauging Emma’s readiness, and says, "Just walk with me.”

"I don’t trail after you like a lost puppy anymore,” Emma says smugly.

“Don’t get cute with me,” Regina says, a warm flush spreading through her. “I’m not the  _puppy parent_. As you’ve pointed out. Come here and walk Henry’s dog.”

The mention of Henry is enough for Emma to stalk out down the walk, and this time Thor is strong enough to bark and twist around on his leash, charging to the new person approaching. He pads at her knees and Emma blinks down at him with an odd kind of resentment. "Henry’s dog,” she mutters, and finally kneels down and scratches behind his ears.

And instantly, of course, becomes Thor’s favorite human in the whole wide world.

* * *

They fall into a routine. Regina walks Thor to Dark Swan’s house every morning and every afternoon after work. Emma joins her on the porch and makes snide comments about Thor while he jumps all over her and she jogs with him, Regina trailing behind.

“I’m not waiting for you,” Emma says when Regina mentions it offhand. “I’m just sitting. On my porch. Where I live. And where you keep showing up.” 

But suddenly Dark Swan’s daily attacks on the town are slowing down, starting a bit later, lacking a lot of bite.

"She came into the drugstore yesterday and paid for a chew toy?” Sneezy says, looking very confused about the whole experience. “And then when she saw me staring, she set a display on fire and stormed out.”

The town is adjusting to Dark Swan. Somehow it’s really hard to take her seriously as a villain when she’s lying on the ground, trying vainly to stop a growing golden retriever from licking her face.

"I will turn you into a sculpture,” Emma threatens Thor. Thor yips and tugs at the bottom of her black leather coat, charging for a squirrel. Emma freezes the squirrel mid-climb and Thor barks at it, sniffing puzzledly when it doesn’t run. She snaps her finger and unfreezes it. “Idiot,” she says.

“Indeed,” Regina says, but she’s watching them both fondly.

* * *

It’s about a month of this before Regina says, “Henry, why don’t you take Thor out on his walk today?”

Henry blinks at her. They don’t talk about it, but he knows who joins her on her walks. Everyone in town knows.

But he presses his lips together and says with all the grimness of a seasoned soldier, "Yeah, okay.”

Regina takes a walk of her own, casual and in the opposite direction of Thor’s usual route. She circles around and makes it to the dog park just in time to see Henry with Thor’s leash in his hand, Emma walking silently beside him and the two of them avoiding each other’s gaze.

Thor tires of their lack of enthusiasm and charges Emma with enough force that she topples backward, crashing onto a park bench, and Henry lets out an explosive laugh.

Emma smiles, bright and glowing, and it’s still in that restrained Dark Swan way but so MUCH that it’s clear from across the park how much she still loves her son. Henry’s cheeks are red, his eyes tentative and hopeful, and mother and son’s gazes lock.

Regina slips back out of the park and heads home, settling in for some quiet gardening while Thor isn’t home to dig it all up.

* * *

Henry gets back later than he usually does; and when Regina glances past the hedge, she sees Emma still with him, the two of them locked in a quiet conversation. Emma’s eyes are fixed on Henry’s face like she’d never thought that she’d see it again and Henry is intense, gesturing, telling her a story about school that has him vibrant like he hasn’t been since Camelot. 

Regina steps out to the walk and says, "Why don’t you stay for dinner?”

Thor yips and runs in circles, thrilled to have his favorite Dark One in his house, and Emma keeps her jacket on and sits silently as Regina and Henry talk. Regina sees her sneaking scraps to Thor at the table but doesn’t comment on it, nor does she comment on how Emma’s eyes flicker from Regina to Henry with a muted wistfulness that makes Regina shiver.

After dinner, Henry heads upstairs to do his homework and Emma follows Regina into the living room, sitting on the floor so Thor can curl up beside her and nap. She absentmindedly strokes his fur as she murmurs, "Thank you.”

Regina sits behind them both on the couch, reaching for a book. "For giving Henry a new chore?”

Emma tugs at her hand, pulling Regina down to the floor to sit beside her so she can give Regina a  _look_. Thor wriggles in between them, tongue out and tail wagging. "You know why,” Emma says, and she looks up at Regina with a face so wholly  _Emma_ , still not quite the one they’d lost to the darkness but certainly this new one who’s let herself be angry but still loves so hard.

Regina leans over Thor, meaning to brush a tentative kiss to Emma’s cheek, but Emma shifts and her lips are suddenly on Regina’s, soft and firm and gently wanting. Regina gives Thor a little push and he moves forward, out of their way, so Regina can slide closer to Emma. Emma kisses her harder, tugs her in and twists so they’re up close against each other, and Regina is panting with need by the time they part. 

“Thank you,” Emma says again, peering at Regina’s face like she isn’t sure how the kiss has been received. “I…” She bites her lip, eyes locked on Regina’s.

Regina says, “You were right. I wasn’t patient enough for a puppy.”

Emma says, “You learned,” in a choked whisper. She slips her jacket off, just a simple black dress beneath it, and she curls up into herself, eyes flickering to Regina in what must be invitation.

She looks like Thor had that first day, huddled on his own on the side of the road, and Regina slips her hand into Emma’s and her head on Emma’s shoulder and says nothing when she hears Emma’s quiet sobs.

Somewhere deep within her, Emma’s waking up again and remembering herself, and Regina lifts their joined hands and presses a gentle kiss to Emma’s wrist, soft and affectionate and with the promise of  _it’s going to be okay_.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> April 2016: a little Swan Queen retrospective, of sorts.

do you ever think about regina and emma after three years of endless bullshit, of always being on the cusp of something  _good_ but never managing to figure out just what it is. 

do you ever think about emma swan worn down after so much time spent trying to find love– to find that elusive kind of all-encompassing love that her parents have and it never quite satisfied with it (she isn’t enough, that must be why it’s not sitting right, that must be why it seems only to hurt her, she hasn’t done enough and tried hard enough and she did it all wrong). 

do you ever think about regina mills who fought to reject fate and destiny but somehow still wound up bound to it– hoping so desperately that it might work out for once (it doesn’t matter who her true love is or what she has to go through to make it work because this is her one chance for love, even if this isn’t how she remembers it feeling at all. at least she has it).

and do you think about how they feel around each other. there are moments when emma’s heart just glows so much it feels like it might burst and there are moments where regina is seized by this fierce  _belonging_ and it’s about friendship, right. it’s about being henry’s moms. it’s about affection except it never feels like it should but–

–maybe it’s just that they’ve never had a friend like this before. maybe it’s just that they’re something more than friends, something indefinable ( _family,_ emma decides, because what else could it be.  _family,_ regina chooses, because there’s no other word that is more than friend aside from–). there’s something between them like heat and warmth and rushing wind, and neither of them can conceive of what more it could be.

regina is summer heat, blazing and scorching if you stand in her path but light and warm. emma is springtime and greens and flowers as they emerge from a winter-ravaged ground. 

no. neither of them are such mild seasons, though long enough with undeserving love has taught them otherwise.

regina is the wind whipping through the trees in autumn, golden-red and unpredictable and on the cusp of something great but still touchable. emma is silent snow reaching higher and higher as it paints the sky grey. they are untamed, unknowable, except when the wind crosses to kiss the stirrings of late-autumn frost.

emma falls in love. regina falls in love. but there’s no word that can raise  _friend_ higher other than  _family_ , so maybe they’re just that.

( _lover,_ emma thinks one day, and wrenches herself free from a season of lies and mild greens and leaps into the fierce grey.  _lover_ , regina wonders once, and three years of truth coalesce around her.)

when they first kiss, it’s so simple– it’s the elusive truth they’ve both been searching for. it’s belonging and it’s hope and it’s every insurmountable obstacle made flat and ineffectual. it’s three little words that finally have meaning beyond  _i fall_ and  _i hurt_ and the creeping doubt of  _how the hell was this worth it._

it’s a fairytale they’ve fought and bled and scraped for for their whole lives, and they gaze at each other, wonderstruck.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> August 2016: I think this was for a Swan Queen Week? It's titled Day One: Confessions and appears to be originally a Twitter fic.

god, just, do you ever think about what emma and regina could be together and get overwhelmed. 

I bet Emma and Regina do, sometimes. More than sometimes. like a nagging thought in the back of their minds about  _perfect._ Emma laughs because there are so many ‘if’s attached to that possibility and she can’t afford to deal in ifs. Regina doesn’t laugh. Instead she digs her fingers into her knees and  _restraint, restraint_ , she knows where this ends and she won't–

–but it’s too late, because Emma’s already in love with someone unworthy and Regina owes her selflessness. Not this agony. 

 _Restraint, restraint_. She offers tight-lipped smiles and regrets every time she lets her guard down but can’t seem to stop. And it’s ridiculous. it’s just an  _idea_   that’s niggling at her, not…she doesn’t feel…that’s not what they  _are_. 

Emma, who’s learned to laugh at the possibility of happiness, is the one who brings it up, of course. It’s late at night and they’ve both probably had too much to drink. Emma’s supposed to be back at her little love nest by now. Instead, she’s fiddling with Regina’s fingers like she’s taken ownership of them, winding her own through them and stroking Regina’s palm. She hasn’t admitted that she’s been fighting with Hook but Regina knows the signs, the silence and defeat and the way she touches… _so much_.

And then the words, light and a little wry, “This would be so much easier if the two of us were in love instead, you know?" 

Regina can feel Emma’s fingers, tugging at a suddenly stiff hand, and says, "But we aren’t,” so sharply that Emma drops her hand, frowning.

“I know,” Emma says, and it shouldn’t burn as much as it does. Regina wrenches her hand free and lifts her glass again. “I was just saying-”

“What?” Regina demands. “We raise our son together? You move in and we do…magic lessons in the yard and lazy Sunday breakfasts and–" Even drunk Emma’s eyebrows are shooting up. "And some idyllic, symmetrical life? Some happily ever after?” Regina says, scorn and disgust and stubbornly hidden longing.

“Maybe?” Emma says defensively. She’s already reclaimed Regina’s hand, holding it firm as though it might escape. “You don’t think we could?”

“I think it’s naive,” Regina bites out, glaring at the wall opposite them. “I thought you knew better than…than thinking…”

When she shifts her gaze, Emma is staring at her. “Than thinking it’d be nice to fall in love with the most important woman in my life?”

The energy in the room has shifted. Emma’s voice is no longer light and airy, and the room is thick with unsaid words. Regina can’t breathe. Finally, she says pleadingly, “You know it’s not that simple. You have…you’re in love with…you don’t get to choose!" Choice is so foreign a concept to both of them and Regina doesn’t know what’s happened to Emma, that Emma suddenly thinks they can…

This is drunken rambling, wistful girl talk in a make-believe world where Emma doesn’t put her boyfriend before everything good for her. Regina forces herself to laugh, to care a little less as she shutters closed doors that had begun to crack open. "Okay, Emma. I’ll bite.”

“I’ve always thought you would,” Emma mumbles, and oh, that’s  _definitely_ drunk Emma, making Regina’s face heat up. 

“How does that work,” Regina says, determinedly ignoring her. “How does this imaginary scenario work out." 

Emma shrugs, but her eyes are clearing again. "I don’t know. I just…I thought that we could fall in love. I don’t know what it means,” she admits. 

“Well, how did you fall in love with the pirate?” Regina says, humoring her. “Surely if you can manage that, you can handle anything.”

Emma looks trapped again. “He was there for me when I was going through a bad time,” she says, chewing her lip. “And he loved me.”

“That’s all it takes? Being in love with you?” Regina demands, frustrated for reasons she can’t name. “Are you that easy to—”

“All it takes with  _you_  is fairy dust, so don’t tell me that  _I’m_  easy!” Emma shoots back, the tension hot between them again.

Regina swallows back her retort, restraint, restraint, takes a deep breath. “I’m sorry,” she says carefully. “That was out of line.”

Emma still looks sullen. “It’s not always like that,” she concedes. “I think I…I realized how much I cared about you when you hated me.”

“I haven’t hated you since the first curse,” Regina whispers, afraid of what it reveals. “Maybe not even then.” Emma’s fingers are tight.

Emma’s eyes are wide, unguarded, startled. “I thought you did when…" 

"No,” says Regina. She means it. Anger, often. Hatred? (How could she?)

“I wish you’d have…” Emma clears her throat, blinking rapidly. “Anyway. My point is…I don’t just give love away to anyone who cares." 

"You also arbitrarily decide to give it to anyone who shares a son with you?” It’s meant as a joke but it falls flat. 

Emma looks pained. "I don’t know how you can see anything about us as  _arbitrary_ ,“ she says, her lips in a thin line. "When we could be  _right_  together–”

Regina tugs Emma to her with their joined hands and Emma’s lips land on hers with a soft exhale, the kiss slow but as all-encompassing as air. She doesn’t pull away, doesn’t recall how the world looks without Emma pressed to her and kissing and kissing her, doesn’t want to remember. 

But an unfriendly reminder comes too soon. Emma presses her hands to Regina’s shoulders and pulls back, leaning her forehead to Regina’s. "Well,“ Regina manages. "Is it…” (Easier, she wants to ask, but Emma’s retreated but she’d kissed back but who said anything about love?)

Emma sits up and their hands are still joined, their hands fall apart, their hands touch only at the tips of their fingers and hold. "You were right,“ Emma whispers, her eyes shadowed and grey and locked on Regina’s. "I was naive." 

 _(Restraint, restraint_ , and it’s long past time for Regina to have accepted that the villain of the story is to be utterly vanquished.)

Emma stands shakily and reaches for her jacket, stares blankly at it as though she doesn’t recognize it anymore. Regina bows her head. And then something light is draped around her, garish and red and Emma’s most prized possession after her car. "What is this,” she says. numb. she’s numb. “Why…” She won’t dare to try to understand Emma’s mind again, to lean too close and be burned.

Emma slides her arms over her abdomen, holds herself like a self-imposed hug or shield, takes a deep breath. "You looked cold,“ she says. "I’ll…I’ll be back for it, okay?” It’s a clumsy promise, an assurance that Emma isn’t going to run from her.

She flees the room, is halfway through the foyer before she stumbles on her feet and lets out a strangled cry and summons magic instead. Regina watches from the doorway of her study, sees the moment Emma’s eyes catch hers and her face brightens.

Grey smoke rises around her. “I love you,” Regina chokes out, fingers clenched into red leather, but Emma’s already gone.


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> March 2018: a tiny alternate ending for OUAT.

It’s been a long few decades, exhausting and full of enough trauma to fill a dozen storybooks. There have been victories and dramas; there had once been a savior with an evil queen, who had shared a child and so much more.

They’ve been apart for a long time, endured new travails and thought, fleetingly, of each other from time to time. With that had come melancholy and wistfulness, odd emotion that rarely accompanies thoughts of friends as much as it does missed opportunities.

But they move forward. Their lives change- both chase a family, but one keeps hers. The other discovers that without the family she’d left behind, the life that had once seemed full of color is only dull greys. She is alone again soon enough, but with it comes contentment.

A sheriff returns to duty, a queen becomes someone entirely new. Time stands still for one of them, and almost no time passes for the other. There is still family, but there’s always something missing; something never quite completes the puzzle.

The once-evil queen returns to a small town in the middle of nowhere, a small town that is her heart as much as the glowing one pulsing in her chest. She brings a son, a daughter-in-law, a granddaughter. She brings them home.

The house that had once been hers is lit in the dark of the night, and she stares up at her lit bedroom windows in surprise. Carefully, she raps on the front door, her heart in her throat at what she may find on its other side.

The door opens slowly, gradually, as though the house’s inhabitant doesn’t expect visitors. A golden-haired savior stands beyond it, her eyes bright and warm and joyful as they take in the scene before her. A savior’s eyes meet a queen’s, both awed and wondering.

A puzzle piece slots into place. Emma says, “Hi.”


End file.
